So it’s been a couple of months since this tournament and I already have bat reps stacked up for the US Masters event so I’m going to push out bat reps 3 and 4 pretty quickly here from Pacific Rim tournament.

Well start out with game 3 and we were up against the team who flew out from Colorado. There was really only one red match up for me (Karen’s Dwarves) so we dropped me first and I got the dwarves and Mike’s VC.

We clearly chose for me to play against Mike. I’d met Mike a number of times at tournaments over the years and am a huge fan of his channel, so I was really looking forward to this game.

Thoughts on the match up:
His list was primarily built around points preservation and trying to goad opponents into his big ghoulstar, so I knew big points would be difficult in this game. From his side of the table, my divination and quicksilver lash would prevent him getting too aggressive with the punchy quick moving elements of his list.

We both deployed fairly evenly spread across, with me concentrating my shooting around a central hill
After a few cagey drops, I dropped everything for first turn wanting to zone his advance to prevent him from pushing into the mid table uncontested.

…Evana knew to be cautious around the living dead. The teeming masses of uncoordinated zombies and ghouls before her may look like easy prey for her disciplined troops but the necromantic magics of the two vampires leading them could greatly enhance their combat prowess.

Fortunately, today would not be won solely by strength of arms. The undead were merely in her way, she needed to slip her forces past them. With the bulk of the undead strength dedicated centrally she needed to distract the undead and slip her forces steadily around their flanks…

…her plan was working perfectly, the bulk of her forces were holding the undead center and monsters at bay. In the meanwhile her right flank were using the cover of the tower to surround a unit of vampire cavalry and effect the breakthrough she needed.

…the leader of her Watchers signaled once and then withdrew a dozen paces as the horde of ghouls scrambled closer. As the first rank of the slavering cannibals hit the traps they simply disappeared, deep into pits or staked ditches, the second rank were shredded by a hail of razor thin metal disks.

Watching his horde dissolve the vampire leading them from the gilded throne slitted eyes narrowed and the hulking varkolak surged forward unnatural will urging the monstrosity to break the line. Evans gathered her magics and unleashed a hail of energy bolts, dealing several mortal wounds and staggering the beast.

As she bent her will against the vampire magic users, focusing all her energy at vaporizing the varkolak her brother gathered his magics to spirit the spears on her right flank through the vampire lines. Evana raised her left hand and signaled, she and Breag covered the infantry line as it shifted and moved past the encumbered ghouls and vampire. Songs would not be sung of this victory, but they’d achieved their goal and outmaneuvered the hordes of undead…

Results and Thoughts on the Game:
This was a very close game, a 10-10 on points led to a 13-7 to me after objective.
The team overall had a fairly good showing, with a big win and a couple of small wins, we weren’t quite at cap, but close.

This game was a very tactical one, neither of us wanted to give the other the advantage and go down with a big loss. I think my opponent could have been more aggressive with his ghoul horde, while I should have been more aggressive on my right flank. Only a cheeky ravenswing in the bottom of the turn got me that objective.

However, we only made it to turn 4, had we managed to play it out things would have been interesting as I’d pincered his cowboy/vamp knights with the frosty, sloop and blue spears and my green spears had almost chewed through the big zombie brick while his varko was nearly re-dead. I could have potentially cleaned up his entire army but the ghoul star if I’d had the remaining two turns.

With that we were up against another team with ETC players and another familiar face from Southern California into round 4… [Read More]

Carrying on our Quickstarter adventures and we have been given the task of fighting some battles as part of the QS Play testing league that has been set up. We have the wonderful privilege of fighting with all 8 armies that were selected, in some specific match-ups. We of course jumped at the chance for some more Quick-starter fun, as we had a blast last time and really enjoy the quirkyness and challenge of the types of battles that these encourage.

So, we have 3 bat reps of battles we did privately and one Livestream battle on our friend @piteglios channel "The Veil of the Ages". All of the actual battles were done in under an hour and even the livestream was recorded in record time, showing that they are quick and easy to get your head around and play - especially if our feeble minds can get to grips with it haha. But most importantly, these are fun games that will really help to encourage new players into our wonderful game, so lets all support it as best we can.

Anyway, too much cheese for my liking so lets get on with it shall we:

We have finally arrived at the epic conclusion of our infamous Wooden Spoon Cup, and quite suitably, we have two fantastically weird looking armies to compete for the coveted title of "Best of the Worst". One of the originally tipped armies (Infernal Dwarves) against one that surprised us all in its glory (Undying Dynasties), both with units that have astounded us with units that just should not be good lol.

If you want the joy and amazement of re-living the entire tournament from start to finish visit our thread HERE, but for those that have been with us from the start I will leave you in limbo for no longer. Nothing more to say here than thank you to everyone involved and that engaged us to help us create a good ol' fashioned bit of fun. Enjoy!

For the final round of the tournament, we would have to fight the Hot n’ Bash team! They are all tournament veterans, and frequent contenders for the ETC team qualification. They had lined up gunlineEoS led by our dear friend and former teammate @Luthor Huss , fighty Orcs, minotaur-heavy Beast Herds and, finally, pyromancy-totting Infernal Dwarves!

Team strategy required that I take on the chaotic stunties, allowing other, better matches for my teammates. Pierre @Kerathop , my opponent, had brought the following:

So the dreaded Pyro/Infernal Icon combo, plus an Alchemy adept, decent shooting, and three good counter-push elements in the form of the Kadims, Tauruk and theEngine. Our deployment type was Dawn Attack and the objective was Secure Target.

Going into the game, I knew that just avoiding and playing safe would probably see me take a medium loss, as the ranged output of the PyromancyProphet is simply too great, and my opponent had numerous scoring units with which to contest or claim the objectives during the last few turns.
So I’d have to be aggressive in my approach, for two reasons: first to limit the number of turns that my heavy hitters would be exposed to pyromancy magic, and second to try and keep the ID away from the objective markers, while my scorers advanced towards them.

To help in this regard I’d need as many magic tricks as possible, so I took Forest Embrace, Awaken the Beast, Chilling Howl, Totemic Summon and Break the Spirit as my spells. The AlchemyProphet chose the Quicksilver Lash and Word of Iron, and the PyromancyProphet got Haze of Magnesia, Fireball, Cascading Fire,Pyroclastic Flow and Scorching Salvo, for a grand total of 5 damage-dealing spells!

My opponent won the roll for picking sides and he placed his objective marker 12” from his deployment zone, near the “gap” of my deployment. Then I spotted an opening: My right-hand corner (the one where I couldn’t deploy troops) had a point that respected the secure target requirements of being more than 12” from my deployment zone and at least 24” from my enemy’s marker. So I chose that spot, since I had a hill to protect my scorers until the last minute, as well as being able to keep all the scoring units packed instead of pitting a single isolated dryad unit against a unit of Flintlocks in the far flank.

Then, for the first time after a long time playing Sylvan Elves, I elected to drop my entire army to begin he game! We ended up, predictably, with a very heavily weighed right flank: I didn’t mind the 18” gap in my deployment, since my units had the mobility to cover that distance and keep the enemy from outflanking me.

The big eagle unit with the Prince flew forward and took cover behind the obstacle inthe middle of the board. With their height and footprint they’d provide a shield from pyromancy for the first ID turn, allowing my weaker units to advance unscathed. To the left, the Kestrels performed an outflanking maneuver, still staying out of sight/range of the pyromancywizard. Finally, the right kestrels moved back (my opponent had done a great job of blocking every possible landing zone for them) , and the second unit of Eagles was shoved forward to provoke a Frenzy check on the Kadims. My scoringdryads started the long slog towards the secure target points, and both the Druid’s retinue and the BSB’s Dancers stayed behind the relative safety of the hill.

In magic my opponent used his binding scroll on the Chilling Howl, then dispelled the Totemic Summon. This left me just enough dice to put Break the Spirit on the Orc Slaves right in front of the Eagles. Shooting destroyed the leftmost unit of wolf riders, and the ball was in the ID court!

The Kadims passed their frenzy check, and no charges were declared. Dwarven movement was cautious, only the Kadims moving forward with the Tauruks close behind. My adversary took great care at preventing any of my flyers from flying over his lines, but this meant that he’d need to stay relatively static.

In the magic phase I used the Binding Scroll on the Blaze Attribute, ensuring that I’d only be getting a single extra D3 S4 hits and not two per spell cast! Magic opened with a high roll of Haze of Magnesia on the Eagles with Prince, and I used all of my dispel dice to make sure that this didn’t go through: the 2d3 s4 and the rerolls to all future… [Read More]